Page 22 - Dinosaur (DK Eyewitness Books)

The first fossil finds

PȦȰȱȭȦ ȩȢȥ ȣȦȦȯ ȶȯȦȢȳȵȩȪȯȨ the fossil bones of giant creatures long
before they knew they were discovering what we call dinosaurs. Scientific
dinosaur discovery began in England in the early 1820s. A doctor named
Gideon Mantell began collecting large fossilized bones and teeth dug up in
Megalosaurus thigh bone
a Sussex quarry. He believed they came from a giant prehistoric reptile and
AN EARLY FIND
This was the first published called it Iguanodon. Soon, the bones of two more monstrous animals came
picture of a dinosaur fossil. to light. The British scientist Richard Owen claimed all three belonged to
In 1677 it featured in a book
by Robert Plot, an English a single group of reptile, for which he invented the term Dinosauria,
museum curator. Plot mistakenly meaning “terrible lizards.” The term appeared in print for the first time in
described the fossil as being the
thigh bone of a giant man. 1842, and the hunt for dinosaurs would soon spread around the world.

GUESS AGAIN!
Gideon Mantell drew this sketch to
show what he believed Iguanodon
looked like. No one had yet pieced
together a whole dinosaur at this
time, so the animal he pictured was
largely guesswork based on a few
broken bones. The animal resembles
an outsized iguana lizard bizarrely
perching on a branch. Mantell
A TOOTHY CLUE mistakenly considered a thumb
Gideon Mantell (1790–1852) noticed that large fossil spike to be a horn that jutted from
teeth like this one resembled the smaller teeth of an the creature’s snout. Iguanodon’s tail was
iguana lizard. That is why he used the name Iguanodon, also incorrectly shown to be whiplike,
meaning “iguana toothed.” According to one story, instead of being heavy and stiffened.
Mantell’s wife Mary found the first tooth among a pile
of stones as she walked along a country lane. In fact,
the first find probably came from local quarrymen,
who were paid by Mantell to look out for fossil bones.
Sharp,
serrated tooth
Dentary
(bone in lower jaw)

THE FIRST OF MANY
In 1824, British geologist
William Buckland (1784–1856)
published his description of
Megalosaurus’s fossil jaw, similar
to one shown here. This
dinosaur became the first to
get a scientific name. Though
Mantell had named Iguanodon
by 1822, he put its name in print
only in 1825. Because scientists
officially recognize a specimen
when it is published and
described, the name
Iguanodon became
the second on a
growing list.

Megalosaurus jaw

20